


In for a penny, repent as leisure.

by Keenir



Series: Learning curve folder [7]
Category: Thor (Movies)
Genre: Gen, Movie Spoilers, Pre-Movie, and thor, when Sif met Loki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-19
Updated: 2013-07-19
Packaged: 2017-12-20 16:11:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/889254
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keenir/pseuds/Keenir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A life is as much a matter of what opportunities you avoid, as what opportunities you miss, and which ones you lose.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In for a penny, repent as leisure.

**Author's Note:**

> I think my Sif muse is trying to kill me with all these fics.

When Sif was a little girl, her mother tried to teach her how to do magic. But the green and gold flames held no attraction to young Sif.

When that failed, Sif's aunts encouraged her to try gardening. Sif enjoyed the hard work just as much as the opportunity to get her hands and clothes and all the rest of herself messy. Even at that tender age, the long hours didn't bother her. It might have worked out, if they did not live next door to Idunn's family. Both girls were entirely too competitive for both gardens to survive.

  


* * *

Sif's father called in a favor to see if his daughter Sif could be tested for any combat potential. 'More than most boys' was the reply after an exhaustive set of determinative bouts.

So it was that she was entered into the school which forged and honed young ones into warriors capable of fighting to defend Asgard.

When graduation day came, when schooling would and each would be assigned a location to be stationed from, all the students were brought to the throne room to swear their loyalty. Remembering family troubles which had brought them to Asgard in the first place, Sif refused to swear loyalty to her King the Allfather - she swore her eternal loyalty to Asgard. Some guards and a few of her fellow recruits started to turn their swords against her, but Odin dismissed them and then the Allfather praised Sif's reply.

  


* * *

Sif was walking through the apple orchards of Asgard one evening when it happened. She'd accomplished a peace with Idunn after a time, so they got along...if in absentia mostly; hence Idunn being fine with Sif's presence there.

She reached up and plucked an apple off one tree, and brought it down for a bite. She was about bite it, when it was snatched out of her hand.

"Oh thank you," an entirely too-cheerful youth her own age said to her, holding the apple casually in one hand.

"That's mine," Sif said.

One eyebrow raised, he answered, "Actually, these are Idunn's. More technically, they are the Allfather's, as he owns all the land he rules, which is..." and gave a grand all-encompassing gesture. "So you're welcome."

"I'm welcome? For what?" she wanted to know.

"Thor's chasing me - he would find you," Loki said, and then gave pause to reflect on the last half of what he had just said.

Just then, a large, blonde-haired youth barely older than either of them, came crashing through the brush and came to a stop not from Sif and Loki.

"That's a Thor," Loki said with a grin.

"Loki, what are you doing here?" Thor asked him.

The dark one's eyes darted back to and from her. Then, with complete sincerity, he pointed an accusatory finger at Sif and informed Thor very crossly, "She stopped me from stealing an apple!"

"She? Oh, hello," Thor said, now realizing that Sif was, in fact, present too. "Thank you," Thor told her, then he told Loki, "You do realize I have to bring you before Father now, brother."

"Yes yes, I know, stealing," Loki said. "Very well, lead on, brother," and let Thor clap a hand on Loki's arm to guide him to the palace.

Sif watched them go. She'd never met the princes before.

  


* * *

Loki never told anyone the truth about the apples.

Nor did Sif...she watched as the story about Loki grew ever more elaborate, even at one point involving Idunn-related bribery.

  


* * *

"No," Sif said, not knowing how much more flatly she would have to say it, or how many more times she would have to repeat herself saying it.

"Thor is the crown prince, certain to inherit -"

"It is within my rights to refuse any offering of proposal," Sif said. "Rank and title do not matter, I retain the right. That decree by King Bor has never been revoked." _Did you think I had not been paying attention in my civil classes?_

"You are stationed alongside Thor the son of Odin. It would be less unseemly -"

 _I am stationed alongside four others beside Thor, but he is your concern._ "What? It would be less unseemly for the crown prince to have his wife protecting him in the midst of battles and killing more foes than does the prince?" and Sif couldn't help but laugh at that.

  


* * *

Sif and Loki traded barbs and jokes and pointy things for many years. Always utterly chaste, they were, as Sif had been weaned on how vulnerable princes were to corruption and beguilement. 

"Not yet," Sif would say when Loki would broach the topic of proposal and marriage. _It is not yet the right time,_ wanting to achieve some tangible battlefield glory before she wed.

  


* * *

It was certainly not the right time in the wake of Thor's being declared the certain heir - that would have felt like a compensation or a confirmation of being second-class.

Nor was anywhere around Thor's banishment an opportune time.

Then she was on Midgard, fighting the Destroyer, and if that didn't say Not Right Now...

Next she knew, Loki was falling from the Bifrost. Falling, falling, falling away, away, away...

The universe is a large place, she knew. _Even if Loki survives, I will never see him again._

  


* * *

_I had my chance. I refused. I am fine with that._ Sif stood alongside Frigga, answering the Queen's questions, about Thor's feelings of loss... and startling only slightly when the Allmother placed a reassuring hand on Sif's arm.

 _My life is a sword I have crafted. For all my days, I shall abide by how my sword has resulted,_ Sif said to herself. Shieldmaiden and soldier of Asgard, she stood, ready to fight until she died.


End file.
